Elegance and Innocence (51 page)

I sit up. The room spins. Every muscle in my body aches. ‘Where is she?’ I ask, forcing my feet back into my shoes.

Imo’s in the front hall now; I follow her. Coffee Carlo’s holding her coat open. She steps inside. ‘Mrs Van Patterson had a call from some hotel in Hyde Park.’ She refers to a piece of paper crumpled in her hand. ‘The Bristol, 77 Rutland Crescent.’ Carlo opens the door and, removing Imo’s keys very gently from her shaking grip, locks it behind us.

Imo’s scanning the street, looking for a cab. Carlo races down to the corner and flags one going in the opposite direction. We wait while it turns round.

‘What did they say?’ I feel sick and cold.

Imo shakes her head. ‘All Mrs Van Patterson said was that she was in trouble. And she wouldn’t leave.’

‘What does that mean? Wouldn’t leave what?’

But she just shakes her head and looks away. I wonder, with a sharp stab of guilt, if she feels I abandoned her last night.

Carlo flings open the cab door and we climb in. My head’s starting to clear; I pull down the window. A rush of cold air hits me. I inhale deeply. All the decadent glamour of the previous night falls away, a dark velvet curtain pulled open, tattered and filthy in the light of day. My imagination races ahead, trying to picture Robbie. The cab lurches and lunges through traffic. It’s one of the longest journeys of my life.

Finally, we pull up in front of the hotel, a tall Georgian town house sandwiched in a row of similar buildings.

Carlo pays the cab while Imo and I rush to the front desk.

An irritable middle-aged Indian man is waiting for us. ‘We are not that kind of hotel,’ he informs us angrily, leading us up to the third floor, jangling a set of master keys. ‘The man, he checked out this morning. We do not allow prostitutes. He should not have brought her in. No guests. That is the rule. You get her and go, right?’

He unlocks the door.

It’s a dark, narrow room, smelling of cheap cleaning fluid and too many cigarettes. The curtains are drawn against the afternoon sun; a narrow shaft of light cuts across the brown carpet. ‘Please, leave us for just one moment,’ I beg him.

He shakes his head but steps back anyway. ‘Ten minutes, you understand? That’s all.’

Imo and I walk in.

Robbie’s curled in a ball on the bed, wearing the same faded fifties floral dress she was wearing last night, only the skirt’s badly torn, her knees grazed and dirty. Her cheeks are covered in black trails of mascara but her eyes are strangely dead. She doesn’t move.

I kneel down next to her and the sickly sweet smell of alcohol hits me. ‘Jesus, Im! She’s completely pissed! Robbie!’ I give her a shake. ‘Robbie! Are you OK?’

She blinks, staring at me as if from across a great distance.

Imo intervenes. She takes hold of Robbie’s face in her hands, forcing her to focus. ‘Did you take something?’ I’ve never heard her be so fierce. ‘Look at me! Did you take anything?’

Robbie shakes her head.

‘Do you promise?’ she persists.

Robbie nods.

‘Then what happened?’ Imo demands, letting her go. ‘What did that bastard do?’

Robbie turns her head slowly, looking first at Imo and then back to me. ‘Nothing. Nothing happens.’ Closing her eyes, she curls up, arms round her head. She’s a child, crouching in a corner. ‘Nothing, nothing, nothing,’ she whispers. ‘Leave me alone!’

I look up at Imo, stunned. ‘We need to take her to the hospital!’

She shakes her head. ‘She’s pissed, Evie. We hardly need a doctor to tell us that.’

‘But there’s something seriously wrong with her!’ I insist. ‘We should call an ambulance!’

Imo’s expression is tough. ‘No. We need to get her home.’ She starts to collect Robbie’s belongings, gathering her jean jacket and handbag; picking up her shoes from the floor.

I watch in confusion and then turn to the Indian man in the hallway. ‘I think we need an ambulance.’

Imo intercepts me. ‘No! It’s fine!’ she assures him, yanking me back into the room. ‘You don’t understand! This happened last term. In fact, it used to happen all the time. You have to trust me. I know how to deal with this. Before you came …’ Her voice fades. She stops, overwhelmed. ‘It used to be much worse,’ she says quietly. ‘Now let’s get her out of here.’

She tries to lift Robbie up.

‘Leave me alone!’ Robbie shouts, pulling away. ‘Don’t look at me!’

I stare at her tear-stained face. She’s familiar and unfamiliar; an unnerving facsimile of her former self.

The angry Indian man’s shouting again. ‘They’ve drunk everything! The minibar is empty! That’s a lot of money, you know! You owe me a lot of money! You’re not leaving till I have been paid or I call the police, do you understand?’

‘Fuck you!’ Robbie lunges at him, nearly falling off the edge of the bed. Imo and I restrain her while Coffee Carlo deals with the Indian man and his unpaid minibar bill.

Carlo rings a friend of his, a man called Jim who delivers baked goods, who gives us a lift to the flat in the back of his van.

‘No cab will take us,’ Carlo explains apologetically, looking at Robbie.

And Imo nods, pressing her hand over his.

When we get home, we put Robbie to bed, fully dressed, with a bucket next to her on the floor.

It’s early evening before she comes to. I’m sitting, waiting, crossed-legged on the floor by her bed.

She turns, groans, then struggles to sit up. ‘What are you doing?’

I gesture to a mug on the floor. ‘I made you a cup of tea.’

‘With sugar?’

‘Yeah.’ I smile. ‘But I drank it about an hour ago.’

She yawns, rubbing her eyes. ‘You’ve been sitting here that long?’

I nod.

‘Why?’

‘I wanted to make sure you were all right.’

‘Really?’ She looks at me quizzically, pulling herself up onto her elbows. ‘Fuck! You haven’t got a fag, have you? And a glass of water?’

I go into the kitchen and come back with both. She drinks the water in a single long gulp. Then we sit in the dark, passing the cigarette back and forth.

‘Listen, about those things I said …’ I begin.

‘Forget about it,’ she cuts me off. ‘It’s over, right?’

‘Right,’ I agree, more than a little relieved to have got off so lightly.

‘And hey, I don’t remember you bursting into tears or anything!’

I smile. ‘You’re right.’

I’m dying to tell her all about Jake; about everything that happened.

She winces, passing a hand over her eyes.

I’ll wait till tomorrow, when she’s feeling better.

‘Just promise me one thing.’ She sighs.

‘What?’

Taking a long drag, she passes the cigarette back to me. ‘I don’t want you giving up and becoming a hairdresser in Eden, Ohio. OK?’

‘Oh! Yeah, right!’ I laugh.

‘I mean it, Evie. Promise me you’ll see it through. Otherwise I’m going to have to come after you!’ Her face relaxes into a smile. ‘We could live together in New York. In the Village. Just you and me.’

‘OK, I promise.’

She leans back against the pillows and shuts her eyes. ‘Did you put that bucket there?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Why am I still dressed?’

‘Why?’ It seems an odd question. ‘Because we couldn’t get you undressed.’

‘Oh.’

She rolls over, her back towards me. ‘Did we have fun? Was it a good evening?’ Her voice is small and muffled.

Is she joking?

‘I don’t know,’ I say, after a while. ‘Don’t you remember?’

‘Of course I remember,’ she assures me quickly. ‘I remember everything.’

I stare at the outline of her thin back. ‘Are you sure?’

But there’s no reply.

She’s asleep. Or dreaming.

Or both.

‘Want a fag?’

Robbie’s walking next to me down Drury Lane. Brilliant spring sunlight sparkles across shopfront windows. The sky is a near cloudless clear blue. I feel like I’m floating, the ground disappearing under my feet. She offers me a packet of Marlboros.

‘I don’t smoke any more.’ My mouth is dry. I lick my lips but my tongue feels like cardboard.

‘Really?’ She seems surprised, as if the idea that smoking might be hazardous to your health is a complete revelation.

‘I haven’t smoked since I was pregnant with Alex; maybe before. I can’t remember.’

She takes out a cheap pink plastic lighter. ‘One of the advantages of being dead.’ She grins, leaning forward and cupping her hand round the cigarette end.

‘Do you mind if we take it easy on the dead jokes?’ I ask.

She glances at me sideways. ‘Am I making you uncomfortable?’

This is such a terrific understatement. And she knows it. She’s enjoying the drama of the situation. ‘A little,’ I concede. ‘Just a little, tiny bit.’

She laughs, smoke streaming from her nose. ‘My, but you’re delicate! By the way, you never came to my funeral.’

I was hoping she’d forgotten. ‘Yeah, I’m sorry about that.’ I’m focusing on the cracks in the pavement. ‘I was pregnant at the time. And broke. New York seemed such a long way away.’

‘Not that broke,’ she reminds me.

She’s caught me out. One of the other advantages to being dead – you have access to the truth, the whole truth. This is the most bizarre social faux pas I’ve ever made. There’s no alternative but to come clean. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry. I was going through a bad time.’

She takes another drag. ‘It was a bad time for me too.’

We walk in silence.

I can hear my footsteps, brittle, fast. But I don’t hear hers.

‘You’d be surprised how much it matters,’ she says after
a while. ‘You think that once you’re dead, it would be the last thing on your mind. But it’s one of those occasions where numbers really do count.’

‘Robbie, please!’ She’s not making this any easier. ‘I really am sorry!’

‘Yeah. I know. You’d gone off me before then anyway.’

I stop. ‘Listen, what is this? Have you come here just to guilt me to death?’

‘Hey.’ She holds up a hand. ‘Lighten up on the dead jokes please!’

This is unbearable. But, perhaps not surprisingly, it’s exactly the way it used to be all the time. ‘You’re just as difficult to talk to as ever!’ I say. ‘Has nothing changed for you at all?’

She thinks a moment. ‘Did I mention I was dead?’

Something in me snaps.

I walk away.

‘Are you denying it?’ She runs to catch me up. ‘Are you denying the fact that you stopped returning my calls? Stopped writing? Stopped even sending me charity Christmas cards with pictures of sparrows in the snow on them?’

I wheel round. ‘People lose touch, Robbie! It happens. OK? So I’m a shit friend. Is that why you’re here? To let me know I disappointed you?’

‘Maybe.’

We’ve stopped in front of a massive Freemason temple
adorned with strange hieroglyphic symbols – eyes peering out of triangles and the like. It’s like a badly made set piece from
The Magic Flute
. She’s panting, struggling to catch her breath.

‘You should know better than to make a dead smoker run!’ She sits down on the front steps, dangling her thin wrists over her knees.

‘What do you mean “maybe”?’ I ask.

She sighs. ‘Well, actually, I’m not sure why I’m here. It’s not clear yet. I mean, it’s obvious you need help – anyone can see that. But I’m winging it at the moment.’ She scratches her nose with the back of her hand. ‘More will be revealed.’

I stare at her. I’m being haphazardly haunted. By a dead school friend who doesn’t even know why she’s here.

She smiles, squinting in the sunlight. ‘Want to get a sandwich?’

‘No. No, I don’t.’

I pace up and down. I’m not sure what I expected but this certainly isn’t it. ‘Anyway, can you do that sort of thing?’

She looks at me. ‘What?’

‘You know, eat?’

‘Sure. It doesn’t taste like much: just so much texture and temperature. That’s one of the downsides. I’d give anything to be able to eat a ham sandwich and really taste it. You don’t know how lucky you are.’

There’s not a lot I can say to that.

The lunchtime pedestrians duck in and around each
other, racing to make the most of their hour. The crisp spring air sharpens everything; everyone’s more genial, vivid. We watch as the queue grows at the Italian deli across the street; girls chatting to each other; men in their shirtsleeves make jokes and flirt.

I sit down next to her. ‘You’ve been dead five years … why are you coming back now?’

She shrugs her shoulders. ‘Well, actually, I’ve been around a long time. It’s just that you can see me now. You’re the thing that’s changed, Evie. Not me.’

‘I don’t understand. I’m not the only one. Everyone else can see you too.’

She looks at me kindly. ‘I don’t think it’s an understand kind of thing. And they can only see me because you can.’

It doesn’t make sense. But I’m not going to pursue the point; it disturbs me that I may have something to do with her sudden materialization.

She continues to puff away, in no particular rush, as if we’re just a couple of office workers sneaking in a crafty fag. I keep stealing looks at her; trying to detect what signals that she’s dead. But if anything, it’s the lack of change that’s so shocking. I’m older, dressed differently; even my perfume’s changed. But the unnerving thing about Robbie is she’s exactly the same. Not just ageless, but caught, from moment to moment even, as if the tape’s being rewound right before my very eyes. It’s a strange, profound feeling
of being stuck; a weight hangs over us, like an unseen lid on a giant glass jar.

‘What was it like?’ I ask, after a while.

‘What?’

There’s no other way to put it. ‘Dying.’

She’s quiet for a long time. ‘Absolute.’ She sounds almost wistful. ‘There’s an eventfulness to great moments; being born, falling in love, Christmas when you’re small … dying is an event, Evie. Maybe that’s why Mom buried me in that weird blue prom dress.’ Her voice is gentle. ‘Taffeta with big puffy sleeves …’

I have an unwelcome image of Robbie’s mother walking around Saks Fifth Avenue in search of a dress to bury her daughter in.

‘But you’re in … in one of your own creations.’ I gesture to her outfit. I’m trying to be tactful; even flattering.

She smiles appreciatively. ‘We always revert to type. Besides, no one can spend eternity in a prom dress.’